The Smart Dieter's Guide To Resist Food Cravings

by BVC Shopify 5 min read

The Smart Dieter's Guide To Resist Food Cravings

Were you looking out for ideas on how to lose weight? Then you would have realised by now that no matter how strong your willpower to lose weight, tone muscles and otherwise improve your health is, the temptation will sometimes get the better of you. It is no matter how much you prepare yourself by keeping unhealthy foods out of your house or cooking rather than eating out, you’ll occasionally end dup feeling powerless and want to give in.


Thus, it’s important that you to feel in control of your cravings, especially when you’re aiming for long-term dieting success. Thus in this article, we will be discussing the psychology of food cravings as well as 5 practical tips to stave off food temptation and keep your weight loss efforts on track.


BLAME Food TEMPTATION ON THE BRAIN


Your mindset has a lot to do with whether you feel tempted by unhealthy foods, or if you can acknowledge passing cravings and say no. Also, how you react to your thoughts can either reinforce poor decision-making habits or enable you to develop new ones that help you stay on track.


Repeating an action, such as eating chocolate or another treat, will cause your brain to increasingly crave that indulgence. Often, the more you give in to these temptations the more they will affect your ability to make positive decisions and resist temptation.


Studies reveal that being unable to resist the urge to eat unhealthy foods is a top-down, conditioned response in the brain that predicts reward from eating certain foods and affects our desire to eat the food. This means that if you derive enjoyment from eating pizza or other unhealthy treats, your body can predict this pleasure and prompt you to eat it, reinforcing these positive feelings.


However, this is not to say that you can’t “retrain” your brain to withstand food temptation and stay on track. Below, we have 5 quick tips to help you do just that.


5 QUICK & Easy Tips On How To Resist The Food Temptation


Here is a generalised point right at front for you. Unless you consciously train yourself with methods to withstand temptation, you’re always going to lose. Luckily, doing so doesn’t take months of time or an impressive show of effort. What it holds true for is that, you just need to be dedicated to making a change.


1: Avoid Treating Diet Like Deprivation


As most cravings arise out of feelings of deprivation. It is as per Michelle May, MD, “Depriving yourself is about resisting, and resistance is difficult. Choosing whether to eat something is empowering.”


Thus, instead thinking of about what you aren’t eating, think about what you will eat. If you stay inclined and focussed on healthy choices, you won’t feel as if you’re deprived and will instead look forward to eating your favourite fruit and vegetables.


2: Avoid Considering Food As A Reward


We all know and fall in the trap of easily justifying unhealthy food as a reward for a long day at work or school or any other reason. Furthermore it’s also easy to use food as a crutch for bad days or failures.  More often, temptation arises out of either scenario giving you justification to give in to your food craving desires.


What’s more important? It is the need to address how you feel and celebrate or handle your feelings in a different way. Do you know that emotional eating, whether for positive or negative reasons, will only add to your problems?


Instead, turn to exercise routines, journaling, or talking to a friend to deal with your emotions. Doing so will help curb food temptation and make you a happier person in general.


3: Plan Your Meals And Snacks


If you’re like most people, then your temptations are at the worst when there is no plan. Picture this that you arrive home late from work and nothing is prepared. This makes it easy to justify swinging by your favourite fast-food restaurant! Why? Simply because you’ve no time for anything else.


Thus, instead of putting yourself in a last-minute predicament where cravings dominate, plan ahead for the week. What this means is that you must prepare meals for each day, including snacks, so nothing is left to chance. In all likelihood, this will help by eliminating most cravings and if you already have food in the fridge, you won’t be as tempted to stop for fast-food on the way home. 


4: Evaluate Why You Crave Fast Foods


As the case is with most people, they can readily identify which foods are their dieting “downfall.” Can you do this too? If so, you’ll have a better handle on your food cravings and why you’re tempted by a certain kind of foods.


Done so? Once, you’ve determined which foods are most tempting, you next job is to consider the why. Is it because you aren’t eating consistently throughout the day, that is causing blood sugar levels to drop and bring about food cravings? Have you made this into a habit? One of eating a bowl of ice cream every night and are finding it difficult to stop?


Getting tp the root cause of any craving is a great way to take control of it. For example, if you know that you aren’t eating enough during the day and have night-time cravings, then you can adjust your intake of healthy foods to stay full and in control.


5: DON’T MAKE EXCUSES


We all know that it’s the easy way to make an excuse to buy a dessert when you really want it at that time. So whether it’s because you’ve been going to the gym regularly or have been eating “well,” finding out an excuse when your brain wants a reward is never difficult.


Here is a better way out. The best thing you can do is learn to recognize the excuses and justifications as you make them. Say for an instance, your friend having ice cream isn’t an excuse for you to do the same. Similarly if you see someone who is in really great shape eating a cookie, you may justify it to yourself as well.


Once it is that you’re mindful of these excuses and justifications, it’s a lot easier to banish them and move on with your day (without the treat, of course).


Time To Stop Food Temptation in its Tracks With 5 Simple Steps. Now!


Retraining your mind on how you think and feel about your favourite unhealthy foods is going to be a challenge. However, by making yourself aware of what you crave for, when you crave it, and realizing why is it that you crave it, you can take steps forward to ensure temptations don’t ruin your weight loss efforts.


Thus, you can always rely on a comprehensive supplement like PhenQ! This in order to suppress cravings while you’re still getting to grips with your own self-control. Doing so is a great way to stay on track and remain motivated. No matter where and when you find yourself tempted by the next treat in store for you.

How do you track your protein intake? Tell us your tips in the comments below.

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